1508 The League of Cambrai is formed by Pope Julius II, Louis XII of France, Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor and Ferdinand II of Aragon as an alliance against Venice.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Cambrai

1593 Italian archaeologist Antonio Bosio first descended into the subterranean Christian burial chambers, located under the streets of Rome. Bosio was dubbed the "Columbus of the Catacombs," and his books long remained the standard work on the underground tombs of the early Roman Church. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Bosio

1854 The second construction of the structure known as St Paul's Outside the Walls was consecrated. The church is one of four major basilicas in Rome. The original edifice was erected by Roman emperor Constantine in 324, and rebuilt as a larger basilica in the late fourth century by the Emperor Honorius (395). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_of_Saint_Paul_Outside_the_Walls

1868 The first traffic lights are installed, outside the Palace of Westminster in London. Resembling railway signals, they use semaphore arms and are illuminated at night by red and green gas lamps.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_lights#History

1869 Wyoming becomes the first U.S. territory where women could vote and hold office. Wyoming Territorial Gov. John Campbell signed legislation giving women the right to vote.

1881 The first Lutheran congregation in southern California held its first service.

1905 "The Gift of the Magi," a short story by William Sydney Porter, 43, was first published. Known by his pen name, O. Henry, Porter's writings were characterized by trick endings, making him a master of short story telling. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O._Henry

The original statue of the brown dog, by Joseph Whitehead, was erected in Battersea in 1906, presumed destroyed in 1910

1907 The worst night of the Brown Dog riots in London, when 1,000 medical students clash with 400 police officers over the existence of a memorial for animals that have been vivisected.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_Dog_riots

1949 Chinese Civil War: The People's Liberation Army begins its siege of Chengdu, the last Kuomintang-held city in mainland China, forcing President of the Republic of China Chiang Kai-shek and his government to retreat to Taiwan.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Kai-shek

1950 Political scientist and diplomat Ralph J. Bunche becomes the first African American to be honored with a Nobel Prize for peace, for his endeavors in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict in Palestine in the 1940s.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Bunche

1956 English Christian apologist C.S. Lewis wrote in a letter: 'In so far as the things unseen are manifested by the things seen, one might from one point of view call the whole material universe an allegory.' en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._S._Lewis

1964 Martin Luther King Jr. receives his Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, saying he accepted it "with an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in the future of mankind."

1993 The last shift leaves Wearmouth Colliery in Sunderland. The closure of the 156-year-old pit marks the end of the old County Durham coalfield, which had been in operation since the Middle Ages.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkwearmouth_Colliery

Over 5,000 people seeking refuge in Ntrama church were killed by grenade, machete, rifle, or burnt alive

1994 Rwandan Genocide: Military advisor to the United Nations Secretary-General and head of the Military Division of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations of the United Nations Maurice Baril recommends that the UN multi-national forces in Zaire stand down. The Rwandan Genocide was a genocidal mass slaughter of Tutsi and moderate Hutu in Rwanda by members of the Hutu majority. During the approximate 100-day period from April 7, 1994 to mid-July, an estimated 500,000–1,000,000 Rwandans were killed, constituting as much as 20% of the country's total population and 70% of the Tutsi then living in Rwanda.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide

1996 Anti-apartheid revolutionary Nelson Mandela, who was President of South Africa at the time, signs the final draft of the constitution into law. It was one of the most liberal constitutions and guaranteed equal rights for all citizens, irrespective of race.

1998 First piece of the International Space Station is launched. Six astronauts open the doors to the new international space station 250 miles above the Earth's surface.

2007 Cristina Fernandez is sworn in as Argentina's first elected female president.

2009 U.S. President Barack Obama is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Obama accepted the award, saying he is humbled and receives it with an acute sense of the cost of war.

2011 Tens of thousands of Russians stage anti-government protests, charging electoral fraud and demanding an end to Vladimir Putin's rule.

1824 George MacDonald, Scottish novelist, poet, and Christian minister, in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. MacDonald was a prolific novelist. He is now known particularly for his poignant fairy tales and fantasy works, and their influence on later authors, such as W. H. Auden, C. S. Lewis, E. Nesbit and Madeleine L'Engle. C. S. Lewis wrote that he regarded MacDonald as his "master": "Picking up a copy of Phantastes one day at a train-station bookstall, I began to read. A few hours later," said Lewis, "I knew that I had crossed a great frontier." G. K. Chesterton cited The Princess and the Goblin as a book that had "made a difference to my whole existence." (d. 18 Sep 1905, Ashstead, England).upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ed/George_MacDonald_%281862%29.jpg/338px-George_MacDonald_%281862%29.jpg

From the daguerreotype taken at Mount Holyoke, December 1846 or early 1847. The only authenticated portrait of Emily Dickinson later than childhood, the original is held by the Archives and Special Collections at Amherst College

1889 Mabel Stark, real name Mary Haynie (d April 20, 1968), renowned tiger trainer of the 1920s and she was referred to as one of the world's first women tiger trainers/tamers.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mabel_Stark

1971 Brian Nichols, American spree killer-known for his escape and killing spree in the Fulton County courthouse in Atlanta, Georgia on March 11, 2005. Nichols was on trial for rape when he escaped from custody and murdered the judge presiding over his trial, a court reporter, a sheriff's deputy and later a federal agent. A large-scale manhunt was launched in the metropolitan Atlanta area and Nichols was taken into custody 26 hours later. The prosecution charged him with committing 54 crimes during the escape and he was found guilty on all counts on November 7, 2008.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Nichols

1909 Red Cloud (Lakota: Maȟpíya Lúta) (b 1822) one of the most important leaders of the Oglala Lakota. He led from 1868 to 1909. One of the most capable Native American opponents that the United States Army faced in its mission to subdue the western territories, he led a successful campaign in 1866–1868 known as Red Cloud's War over control of the Powder River Country in northeastern Wyoming and southern Montana. The largest action of the war, the Fetterman Fight (with 81 men killed on the US side), was the worst military defeat suffered by the US on the Great Plains until the Battle of the Little Bighorn ten years later. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Cloud

1941 Colin Kelly, American World War II B-17 Flying Fortress pilot who flew bombing runs against the Japanese navy in the first days after the Pearl Harbor attack. He is remembered as one of the first heroes of the war for sacrificing his own life to save his crew when his plane became the first American B-17 to be shot down in combat.(b. 1915)en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Kelly

Washington Senators World Series 1924 - Walter Johnsonwww.youtube.com/watch?v=JgqGYkXZjqY1946 Walter Johnson, American baseball player, nicknamed "Barney" and "The Big Train", right-handed pitcher. He played his entire 21-year baseball career for the Washington Senators (1907–1927). He later served as manager of the Senators from 1929 through 1932 and for the Cleveland Indians from 1933 through 1935 (b. 1887)en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Johnson

1946 Damon Runyon, American journalist and author (b. 1884)

1958 Adolfo Camarillo, American horse breeder (b. 1864)

1962 Norman A. Madson, hymn translator, (b. 16 Nov 1886, Manitowoc, Wisconsin). He was educated at the Wittenberg (Wisconsin) Academy, Luther College (Decorah, Iowa), the University of Chicago and Luther Seminary (Hamline [Saint Paul], Minnesota). Ordained on 14 November 1915, he served as a traveling missionary of the Norwegian Synod on the Iron Range in Northern Minnesota from 1915 to 1916. He taught at Luther College from 1916 to 1918 and was a chaplain in the U.S. Army from 1918 to 1919. He served pastorates at Bode, Iowa, and Princeton, Minnesota. He was president of the (Little) Norwegian Synod in 1935, editor of the Lutheran Sentinel (1927–1929), secretary of the synod’s Committee on Church Union and a member of the Intersynodical Committee on Hymnology and Liturgics and the Norwegian Synod Home Mission Committee.

1968 Karl Barth, Swiss Reformed theologian. Barth is often regarded as the greatest Protestant theologian of the twentieth century. His influence expanded well beyond the academic realm to mainstream culture, leading him to be featured on the cover of Time on April 20, 1962.(b. 1886)en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Barth

1968 Thomas Merton, American monk and author by accidental electrocution while attending a conference of Buddhist and Catholic monks in Bangkok, Thailand. (b. 1915)en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Merton